In the Shadow of Hősök Tere
by SabrinaScissorhands
Summary: Nat's and my relationship is all but nonexistent, built on stolen kisses and hands held at hospital beds. Late nights and backstreet motels. Frantic rescue missions and half-dead If I don't make it speeches. BlackHawk.


When Natasha wakes up, her hair is falling into her face, blocking her downcast eyes from my view. Her lips are parted, her fingers are clutching the sheets tightly. A broken sigh falls from her lips, and her head swivels away from me. She sits up, pulling the blankets around her. For a long time she is frozen like that. Her shoulders sink. Her shaking fingers press her hair back into place.

Natasha gets up without a word.

_Regret_ is the word most people would pin on her behavior.

She scoops up her clothes, slips into the bathroom, and the door _click_s shut behind her.

I swallow down, propping myself up on my elbows. My eyes flit shut.

Nat's and my relationship is all but nonexistent, built on stolen kisses and hands held at hospital beds. Late nights and backstreet motels. Frantic rescue missions and half-dead _If I don't make it_ speeches.

I have learned very quickly that it was easier to build a relationship where one would jump in front of a bullet for the other than one where one would kiss the other willingly.

She has earned her name _Black Widow_. She can weave a web better than anyone I know, but this time she has trapped herself in it. Every time she sleeps with me, she wakes up caught in the impossible promises she made to herself. And every time she wakes up, it is not regret she feels.

She told me once in an offhanded whisper, standing before the sea one insignificant weekday morning that she did not love. She told me once that she could not.

And when she wakes up with me, she never seems to quite know how to feel. Her mind speaks one thing and her body screams in disappointment with her own head.

Maybe I would be hurt by this if I didn't know her so well. I know when she comes out of that bathroom, she'll act like it didn't happen, but I'll still see it in her eyes. The ghost of her own knowledge. And I've always let her slip by.

I slip out of bed, pulling last night's clothes on and then sit on the bed to wait for her to emerge again. Today will be different, and out of her own web I will coax her. Not pull her or cut her. Natasha has been doing a pretty poor job of freeing herself from it, but all she needs is prodding.

When she comes out, she's drying her hair with a towel. Her eyes are turned away from me. "Clint, I think—"

I catch her by the wrist, turning her to face me.

A slightly confused smile pulls at her lips. "Yeah?"

I slip my hand behind her neck. She immediately takes a step backwards, but I follow, my face centimeters from hers.

"Clint…"

"Nat." My lips meet hers for a fleeting moment before she jerks away, eyes flying to mine. "What _is_ it, Natasha?"

"Last night," she clips, "was a mistake." She steps away from me, and this time I let her.

"You don't mean that."

She takes a deep breath, hands clenching at her sides. Her lips purse tightly. Her eyes blink rapidly. "Of course I do. Lapse of judgment."

"But don't we know that's not true? You could have used that excuse the first time," I return, stepping closer to her. "Or maybe even the time after that."

She looks sharply away from me.

"Natasha."

No response.

"Nat."

Nothing.

I shuffle closer. "Nat, _pozhaluista_."

Her fists tighten at her sides. "Don't," her voice cracks, "do that."

I hesitate, reaching out to adjust a strand of her hair. "You wouldn't really hit me, would you?" I question, looking to her hands.

In answer, her fist clips me under the chin. I stumble back, hitting the wall. She stalks over, hands snatching me by the front of my shirt. "Stop," she whispers, "doing this." Her teeth clamp down on her lower lip, and her face falls.

Reaching up, I remove her fists from my shirt. Gently I push her back until she is sitting on the edge of the bed. "We've got a mission, Clint. We can't be—"

"If you make up one more excuse as to why you can't love me—" she cringes at that, "—then I think you just might kill me."

"Stop. Stop saying stupid things like that."

"Things that express emotion?"

She snaps, "Useless emotions. You always say such stupid, _useless_ things. You sound like… like a child."

I fall silent at that, knowing that everything Nat says after this will just be denial. Anything else I say will just result in responses of rejection from her.

And so after a moment, I say, "You're right. We should go."

Yet we sit there. She is motionless, except for her eyes, which rise from the floor to rest her gaze on my face. I take that as permission, and so I reach up, cupping the side of her face. She lets me kiss her, and that in itself says enough.

;x

We've had to deal with this organization before. They have a base in an old building at the center of a populous city. They're a group of crazed scientists, working with elements and compounds that shouldn't be touched by even the most trained hands.

"You take the first floor, I'll enter through the roof," I say as we draw upon the building.

"Right."

It takes next to no effort to get to the roof. My feet hit the ground noiselessly, and I quickly locate the door. It is embarrassingly easy to break through.

I ease my way down the cement steps; last time we were here, their lab was set up on the top floor. That was in another building in a neighboring country, and we all but blew that to smithereens. Perhaps they've learned better, though.

Turns out they haven't.

It takes only a short trip down the stairs before I can see their labs. Bottles spilling over shelves, biohazardous materials are lying about without caution, chemicals boil away with no one paying them any mind.

I press a button on my wrist. "Nat."

A few moments later, "Yeah?"

"Top floor."

"Roger."

I duck back behind the cement stairwell wall, just off the hall by the lab, waiting for Nat. From here, I'm not sure what we should do. We could call in S.H.I.E.L.D.—they've got planes waiting not far off, just waiting to take these guys in. But if they see us in there, they'll no doubt kill us. And we can't just barge in there, or we'll blow the place up. We made that mistake last time. No, we have to lure them out of there before taking them.

It is, like most things, easier said than done.

Natasha appears a moment later at the end of the hall. Ducking beneath the large windows of the lab, she appears in front of me.

"We have to draw them out of there," she says right away.

"My thoughts exactly."

She looks up at me. "I have no idea how to do that."

"Well. Do they have a doorbell?"

Nat elbows me in the gut. "Be serious. We could scare them out."

"How?"

"Hell if I know. Okay, but what if I go out there and they see me. They should come out, right?"

"Nat, these guys are the equivalent to suicide bombers. They see you, they'll blow themselves up too. Not letting you do that."

She groans. "What other option is there?"

"Surrender," comes a heavy accented voice.

My eyes fly up, and Natasha spins around to face the man. He's dressed in a white lab coat and is holding an oversized gun. He cocks it, and immediately I knock an arrow and throw Natasha backwards. My arrow flies right past him, attaching itself to the lab's window, and he then aims the gun downwards slightly.

"Good job," he states.

"It was," I breathe, taking a step forward. He is forced backwards, eyebrows up.

He raises his gun again, but I drop my bow to the floor, continuing to step forward until he's nearly pressed against the glass. The man seems amused by my actions.

"Clint, no—"

Then the explosion tears through the lab. I'm sent skidding backwards against the concrete, and I can feel my skin searing.

"Oh, god," I groan, forcing myself to my feet. But my legs collapse under me, and the world is fading in and out of black.

Then I feel Natasha's hands, scrambling to pull me up the stairs. "Clint, you idiot, stay awake."

The next thing I am aware of is lying on the roof, the sun beating down on my scorched skin. My skull feels like it's split in half, my lungs feel nonexistent. I am choking on my own blood.

My eyes flicker shut, but I feel a sharp slap in the face.

"Don't you dare fall asleep on me, the planes are coming."

"Why not?" I groan. I try to fight it for her, but my eyelids are like bricks. And they refuse to do my will. "It won't hurt anything," I whisper, even though everything hurts right now.

"You idiot." Vaguely I feel her squeezing my hand, and then, "Because I love you, god dammit."

And just before I fall into unconsciousness, a ghost of a smile reaches my lips, the shadow of Hősök tere scorched into the insides of my eyelids.

;x

The beeping pounding on my eardrums is objectionable. I take a deep breath, despite the fact that every muscle in my chest screams in defiance. Before I can even form a coherent thought, a familiar voice calls my name.

"Nat," I breathe, peeling my eyes open. "How are you?"

"I thought you were going to die on me, Barton," she seethes, rushing over to my bedside.

I spread my arms as much as I can. "Ta da."

"You insufferable idiot," she says sharply. She's giving a weak smile, despite. "There was a better was of going about that."

"Nah, there wasn't."

She sighs. "What do you remember?"

"I remember," I draw slowly, "after the explosion. I remember you."

"Of course."

"Was that just a mistake too?" I ask. "It was the first time, so you can still use that as an excuse."

The expression on her face twists painfully. "Clint…"

"Tell me now, so we can get that worked out as soon as possible."

Nat remains silent, eyes downcast. Slowly she steps over to my bed, leaning down ever so slightly. Her lips part, seemingly in confusion. Then before she can stop herself, she takes my face between her hands and for the first time, Nat kisses me.


End file.
